


awake and feel the ache

by knowyourwayinthedark



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - Javert Survives, Backrubs, M/M, Massage, Middle Aged Virgins, Multi-Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-23
Updated: 2013-05-23
Packaged: 2017-12-12 15:39:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/813207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knowyourwayinthedark/pseuds/knowyourwayinthedark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Javert's hands are really large, Valjean's probably really strong... I just want one of them giving the other a backrub. Shameless fluff, smut optional (but encouraged)."</p><p>Did not turn into smut, not exactly shameless fluff, and the backrubs are a long time in coming, but still.</p><p>Javert and Valjean through the years, sore muscles, and awkward touching.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I kind of tried to bookverse, except then I fucked with the timelines a little musical-style, and then there was a surprise Quastvert. So uh yup

He has grown mechanical in his movements, turned to iron and wood and wire, tempered in the fires of mindless, unending work; he has progressed past a state of being merely a beast and become entirely an object, no more a man than the windlass or the crank.

Yet even a machine may break, and so it is that on a sweltering August morning, sixteen years into his sentence, Jean Valjean swings down his pickaxe and grimaces at the sudden, sharp pain in his back.

But it is bearable. He shoulders his axe again. A few hours more, though, and the initial twinge has spread to an aching, torn sensation, and he cannot stop himself from hissing with each swing he takes, the jarring of iron on stone sparking fresh pain in his back. He sets down his axe and, grimacing, tries to roll his shoulder, but the muscle along the right side of his ribs stubbornly resists stretching, and instead provokes another grunt of pain; it is tense, too tense, and the tight swollen ache locks his arm close to his body.

This does not go unnoticed.

“Prisoner 24601.” Boots, hardly stained with the dust of the day, enter his vision. “Return to work.”

He straightens up slowly, meets pale eyes and a fearsome scowl.

“My back hurts, monsieur.”

Heavy brows lift for a moment. “You have been here for sixteen years.” Valjean, not knowing how to respond, keeps quiet. The gaze turns piercing. “Is that correct? Prisoner, speak when spoken to.”

“Yes,” Valjean grits out.

“You ought to be used to this by now.” The guard takes a measured pace around to Valjean’s side, outside of Valjean’s vision. Valjean stays still. There is a quiet, contemplative grunt, then, “Where does it hurt?”

Valjean gestures. “Hmm,” he hears the guard say, and abruptly there are long fingers pressing through the fabric of his cassock, prodding at the muscle. Valjean sucks in a breath through his teeth, and the fingers pause. Then, after another moment, they lift and press at another spot, lighter this time.

The touch is too dispassionate to be gentle, Valjean realizes, but it is the first touch he has felt in a while that is, at the least – not cruel. The guard flattens his wide palm against the curve of the muscle and squeezes, very carefully; even as Valjean flinches, and as appraising and distant the touch might be, the warmth of the hand does something bewildering to his chest. When the guard’s hand drops away after a few moments more, the breath is tight in his throat. It baffles him – it is a taste of something that would satisfy a long-forgotten hunger – it is fading, too quickly – it sinks into the mire of anger that fills him, it becomes another one of the frustrated needs that compose his hate.

The guard circles his body to face him again. “You will need the infirmary,” he says. “Likely the muscle is torn, I have seen this before. They have had you working to relieve those six men who have just caught the fever,” he adds, glancing at Valjean; Valjean is not used to this, these questions that are not questions, but the guard looks expectant, so he nods tersely and mutters, “Yes,” in response.

The guard lets out another quiet grunt. “Well, we cannot have that,” he says at last. “Perhaps I will speak to the man overseeing heavy labor. You may have the strength of four men, but it is not as though there are no other four men who may do the same task in your stead, and spare the infirmary the task of tending to you for a good month.”

Valjean says nothing, only glowers.

The guard sighs. “You are a quiet one. Well, come now, 24601,” and the scorching sun through Valjean’s cassock, and the glowing embers of hate within him, are the only warmth he feels for a very long time; the memory of long fingers and a careful palm is consumed between them both.


	2. Chapter 2

Javert’s posture is unusual, Madeleine notices; it would not take a particularly observant man to notice that the set of Javert’s shoulders is somewhat stiffer on this day, and when he makes his bow the tension in his face is plainly visible when he comes back up.

But Madeleine has been watching, so these differences are more obvious to his eyes. Why does he watch? There is the nervy twitching of the convict within him, uneasy and shuffling his feet at the presence of the law, and a niggling feeling he knows Javert somehow; there is Javert’s almost offensive scrutiny, which, as a man of standing, he feels obliged to return as fair turnabout in some manner; there is the way the man is shunned – friendless – alone, and once Madeleine has begun to watch, he finds he cannot stop. Javert is a decent man. Harsh, it is true, but he brings his harshness to bear on corrupt yet popular merchants and mendicant beggars alike. The people of Montreuil, in their turn, are suspicious, and for the most part do not treat him with any more than barest courtesy. Quiet investigation reveals that Javert entertains no callers, save for a few who are inevitably informers or messengers from the Prefecture. As far as Madeleine can tell Javert seems satisfied with his isolation.

Somehow, he is fascinated.

“Inspector Javert,” he says, just as Javert turns towards the door, and when Javert looks back over his shoulder he grimaces again in pain – “You seem unwell,” Madeleine says, and the grimace turns into a scowl. It is a strangely familiar scowl.

“I am fine,” Javert says stiffly. “It is only that I have cramped my neck. The Michaud boy was not very cooperative when I took him in for forgery. It is nothing, Monsieur Mayor,” but he shakes his head on the last words, and another flinch twists his face.

“It does not seem like nothing.” Madeleine speaks cautiously, but inside he is still peculiarly conscious of a warm feeling in his gut – the Inspector is human, after all, at the mercy of the whims of his body, bound like any other man by its constraints and limits. Standing up, he rounds his desk.

Javert looks exceedingly confused. “Is there anything else, monsieur…?”

“Come, sit,” and Madeleine gestures at a wood-backed chair. Uncertainly, like the chair will disappear if he is not careful, Javert settles on it. He folds his hands in his lap, long fingers latticing together; Madeleine is struck, again, with an uneasy sense of recollection, but pushes it aside as he moves to stand behind Javert. Javert tenses.

“Monsieur, what –”

Cautiously, Madeleine settles one hand on the only part of Javert’s neck not covered with his collar – where it meets his skull, right under the ribbon tying back his queue. Javert gives a tremendous start.

“Monsieur ought not to do this,” he snaps out, but there is a little quiver in his voice. Carefully, Madeleine squeezes the taut cords of tension he feels in Javert’s neck, and there is a harsh breath from below. “Monsieur –”

“Quiet, Inspector,” he says, and rubs his thumb against a knotted muscle. “Have you thought of warming a wet cloth, and using it as a pad for your neck?”

“I will be sure to do that, monsieur.” The exasperation in Javert’s voice does not entirely hide how it hitches a little when Madeleine squeezes once again, this time rubbing his fingers in circles, rolling the pads and pressing deep into the stiffness. “Now, if you would be so kind – there are other things I would like to do –”

“I thought to be helpful.” Madeleine keeps his voice mild. “It will take only a moment.”

When he eases his fingers down under the collar of Javert’s uniform and begins to run his fingertips in firm, long strokes, Javert makes only a halfhearted grumble before wincing and muttering, “There – it hurts – ow,” and the rest of his words dissolve into a sigh as Madeleine massages at the knot, his back presses against the chair, and his head falls forward a little. Even from Madeleine’s angle the flush is visible in Javert’s cheeks. Another soft, wordless groan escapes him as Madeleine rubs again, feeling the muscles ease under his fingers, and –

– and then they are tense again, as Javert snaps, “There, I – I am fine.”

He ducks out from under Madeleine’s grasp and stands. “Thank you, Monsieur,” he adds, gratitude entirely absent from his voice, and leaves before Madeleine can say anything.

Madeleine stands in the center of the room, and tries to comprehend the pounding heat in his belly, the tingling of his fingertips; Javert’s moan seems to still reverberate in them, and he resists, with difficulty, the urge to smell the scent of Javert’s hair that no doubt lingers there.


	3. Chapter 3

The pain only makes itself known the day after, rearing its head in every inch of Madeleine’s back – an agonizing symphony played out by cramped shoulders and the overstretched muscles of his sides, the dull ache of his lower back a solemn, steady percussion. The preoccupation of his mind does only so much to slow its progress.

He has secured Fauchelevent and his broken kneecap a place in the infirmary, purchased the cart and the horse; with that done, he returns to his duties, easing himself into his chair at his desk with a little groan.

But his thoughts are beyond the paperwork his eyes skim over, mechanically. Javert’s words still circle in his head, and fear builds and sinks in his heart; Javert has suspected – that is why he watches – Madeleine tries to pick out Javert’s face from nineteen years’ worth of memories of guards, and finds he cannot, for they are all dreamlike, monstrous, faceless. Perhaps one or another had the same sideburns and pale eyes, who can tell? His mood grows drearier, and he slumps a little, enough that when he next straightens up, at a knock on the door, he winces at the soreness in his back.

Then he freezes, as Javert enters without waiting for a response.

“Monsieur,” he says abruptly, and Madeleine stares.

“Yes?” he asks, hoping his voice is steady.

Javert steps forward and – Lord, what is happening there? Javert’s movements are both bizarrely predatory and – uncertain, there is a strange swing to his step and – oh. Oh. Madeleine presses back in his chair, face reddening, as Javert comes closer.

“I apologize for my suspicions,” Javert says flatly. “They were unjust accusations, and it is clear to me now that you cannot be the convict I recall.” He pauses, then continues, voice oddly low, curving around the words, “If, perhaps, I might show my – appreciation for your strength – and the deed you have done –”

Javert’s words are too wooden and stilted to be properly seductive but Madeleine still feels his face burn hotter.

Javert pauses, then inclines his head. “Is your back very pained, monsieur?”

When he realizes what Javert intends it is too late to decline gracefully, and in any case, Javert has already crossed the distance between them – moving with the stalking gait of a wolf, as far from sensual as one could be – Madeleine stays in his seat, paralyzed, as two large, warm hands settle on his shoulders.

Javert begins to rub, unpracticed sweeps of his hands. It is too late now to pretend like he does not need it, even Javert’s inexperienced hands are welcome on his sore muscles, and his sigh of relief is entirely involuntary, pressed from him by Javert’s palms against his shoulderblades. A waistcoat and a shirt are all that separates them, and he prays, silently, that they will be enough to hide the ridges of his scars – “Javert,” he says, suddenly struck with an idea.

Javert’s hands pause. “Yes?”

He is hardly making any effort, now, to disguise the suspicion in his voice under seductive pretense, and Madeleine is somehow relieved. Whatever Javert’s affections might be towards him otherwise, at least here Javert is acting as the Inspector, not the man, which makes it easier for him to say, glibly, “I would prefer it if you could massage my scalp, instead.”

He is sure that Javert’s eyes narrow. “I am not sure how to do that,” Javert says warily, and Madeleine could take the chance, could simply dismiss him with a gentle, reassuring word or two, and the matter would be done.

But he cannot deny that fear is not the only thing tightening his throat at Javert’s touch, his body hungers for contact, and it is with guilty relief that he says, “Do your best,” waves a flippant hand, and shuts his eyes.

Javert’s hands are frozen still on his shoulders. Then they lift away, and a moment later, Madeleine feels long, tentative fingers slide into his hair. They rest there for a second, then Javert’s fingertips press, and slide against his scalp, moving over the crown of his head, from the whorl of his hair forward to his temples.

A dizzying, tingling sensation rushes down from his scalp to his toes. Madeleine swallows violently, heart pounding. The intimacy of the gesture is too much. He did not know his head was quite so sensitive – or that Javert’s fingers were capable of making him so aware of the rush of blood in his veins, the pounding of it through all parts of his body –

Javert continues, and Madeleine worries, now, how to extricate himself from this situation, made more difficult considering that now he does not want Javert ever to stop. He is melting, unable to do much more than clutch at the arms of his chair like a man at sea.

Javert is not skilled, he realizes; he presses too hard in some places, too lightly in others, accidentally tugs one lock of Madeleine’s hair almost enough to break it. The movements of his hand echo the perfunctory quality with which one pets a shaggy-haired beast. It does not matter. It is pathetic, how much he has ached for this sort of human, tender gesture – even if it is from a man whose motives are downright dangerous, even if to obtain it he must resort to base trickery and manipulation –

Madeleine clears his throat. “You may stop,” he says, “thank you – Javert – thank you very much.”

Javert’s hand pulls away immediately and he rounds the desk to face Madeleine. “Will that be all?” His lips are tight; Madeleine can see a barely contained fury in him, and an almost petulant hurt.

“Yes.” He does not dare say more. When Javert leaves, it is like he is beneath the cart again, sinking under its heaviness; he hunches, descends into the mud of guilt and fear, until the ache in his back is only one more thing to weigh him down.


	4. Chapter 4

He did not mean to do it, but there are not many options when one is struggling to prevent six feet of snarling, spitting, half-drowned Inspector from returning to the river from which he had just been dragged – so Valjean had sat on Javert’s back and tried to hold down his arms and in the process, well –

Now Javert is slumped on the bed, two days later, glowering more ferociously than Valjean has ever seen any man alive glower, rubbing at the pulled muscle at the back of his neck and shoulder. Valjean winces whenever he sees the man struggle to reach to drag a blanket over himself, or pull on a new shirt; Javert hisses like a cat, though, when he moves to help, and snarls incoherent phrases if Valjean even lingers in the room longer than he deems necessary.

In short, it is exactly what Valjean might have expected from saving Javert’s life and installing him in his own home. 

Gritting his teeth, he enters the bedroom as one might enter a lion’s den.

The comparison becomes even more apt at the sight of Javert sitting up in bed with his hair loose and wild, a graying mane that only adds to the effect of his bestial expression. “Oh, the saint appears,” he sneers. Valjean ignores him in favor of approaching closer, face set.

Initially Javert had been too weak, after his first bursting attempt to drown himself again, to fight much; Valjean had managed to haul him back home that night, though dragging him up the stairs was taxing to them both (likely Javert nurses some extra bruises from the edge of one step or another, perhaps in locales he does not wish Valjean to see) and at first it was relatively easy to strip away Javert’s soaked, ruined clothing, to wrap him in cocoons of dry warmth, to feed him the sort of gruel Valjean vaguely recalls the nuns feeding Cosette when she caught chills in her youth. Worry had knotted his brow, as Javert coughed and shivered all that first night, and Javert’s eyes on him were raw and thick with shame and apology and – all sorts of things he could never have expected from that man. There were words, too, muttered in fitful slumber, but Valjean did not hear what they were, only the anguish threaded beneath them.

But Javert is prickly like a mountain shrub, with just as stubborn a rooted grip on life, and by morning, his cough was much better, his skin devoid of any feverish flush, and his attitude surly, recalcitrant, and vicious. In a word, normal.

Valjean sets the tray of food down on the bedside table.

Javert scowls at him. “How am I supposed to reach that? Not with my arm near twisted out of its socket, certainly. A fine job you have done in rescuing me if all my life will be from this day forth is sitting about in bed, eating porridge with a wrenched arm.”

Patience, Valjean tells himself, patience; he thinks of candlesticks and kind eyes and little birds and the sweet piping songs Cosette would sing as a child; he gives up, completely, and makes a curt gesture. “Sit up.”

Javert’s eyes narrow. “What?”

“If your back is so grievously wounded, I ought to tend to it. Sit up. Tell me where it hurts.”

Javert shrinks a little bit back into his nest of pillows at Valjean’s flat tones but still manages to spit, “No, absolutely not, you will not lay hands on me –”

He tries to shuffle away but tangles in the sheets, then Valjean has barred his escape, bending over him and reaching across Javert’s body, planting one hand on the covers, preventing the man from escaping to another corner of the bed. The other hand flattens on the back of Javert’s ribs. He presses cautiously. Javert hisses.

“Christ, Valjean!” But he does not yank away, only winces, and his face relaxes as Valjean presses his fingers deeper, moving his hand in a small circle, easing the tightness – a tiny noise escapes from Javert, their eyes meet, Javert flushes. Valjean thinks he does, too. The linen of Javert’s shirt is very thin and the heat of his skin is obvious through it; obvious, too, is the open collar, the hollow of Javert’s throat, the pulse of a vein visible in the shadow.

“Fine, then,” Javert says. It comes out suddenly hoarse, like he is a rusted hinge. Valjean’s eyes follow the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallows. “Go on. Do it. Clearly you know where I am sore – of course you would, you were the one who mistook my arm for a weed in need of uprooting,” but the insult is weak, muttered half-heartedly, Javert’s gaze flitting uneasily away to somewhere on the opposite side of the room.

“I do not know exactly where,” Valjean says, and lifts away the arm blocking Javert’s escape. He counts it as a victory that Javert does not attempt to skitter away as he sits on the bed. He shifts his hand, squeezing lightly at the muscle high on Javert’s back, directly behind the armpit. “Here?”

“Yes, yes.” Javert’s lips tighten briefly. “And the side of my neck, too,” he adds testily. “No, not there – lower. Around the shoulder. And lower than that, too.”

Valjean has had to bring both hands into play to probe at all the places Javert has been describing, and now he gives Javert’s position an appraising look. “Do you think you can lie flat, and roll over?” He cuts off the beginnings of Javert’s snarl with a swift explanation, “I do not think I can reach all the places you are sore – unless you have a better idea,” and watches Javert’s brow furrow.

“Fine,” Javert snaps, and fumbles covers and pillows – glaring at any offered hand of help – until he lies flat on his belly, too-large borrowed shirt tangled about him, hands resting, half-curled, alongside his head. He turns his head towards Valjean; horizontal as he is, and with his face crushed into a pillow, his expression is difficult to read, but Valjean would bet money Javert is scowling fit to make the Devil flinch. “Go on, then.”

Valjean shifts position, reaches, and pushes the heels of both hands into Javert’s upper back, starting from the spine and pushing outwards, towards the shadows of his scapulae, then finishing with a slow squeeze of the muscles directly below Javert’s armpits. Javert twitches under his hands. “You are doing both sides, it is not necessary,” he snaps, muffled by the pillow.

Valjean cannot think of anything to say in response – instead he lifts his hands, repeats the motion of before, only higher, pushing along the triangles of muscle where neck meets shoulder, putting his weight into it now. “Oh, God,” comes a groan from below, cut off quickly with an uncomfortable, “Hurry up, Valjean, I –” Javert’s words melt, like candlewax, run into a burbling moan; Valjean can catch only glimpses of Javert’s face, corners, clenched eyelids, a vein defined on a temple.

The linen of the shirt gathers in obstructive folds under his palms, and after another few passes he gives up, takes hold of the hem – “What – Valjean, you –” and pulls it up as far as he dares, then slides his hands beneath it. Javert shivers, and a slow exhale eases from his mouth with the push of Valjean’s hands. Skin on skin is stranger. Valjean’s palms are sweaty, and he hopes it is not unpleasant. He wonders when it was that he began to worry so about Javert’s pleasure. He finds knots of scars, here and there, and coarse hair drags at his fingertips. What of Javert’s back he can see, exposed by the rucked-up shirt, is a map in the candlelight; hills and valleys, dimples appearing and disappearing as the light flickers and Valjean’s hands smooth and stretch skin.

He kneads and works at the flesh of Javert’s back, far beyond the borders Javert had indicated; he judges his way by moans and by grunts of pain that grow less sharp with time; he moves his hands down to push and dig his thumbs into the tension at the root of Javert’s spine, and as his hands spread over Javert’s hips there is a rolling motion, a press back. “Javert,” he says, tongue thick and stupid in his mouth, but Javert’s fists are white-knuckled in the sheets, and his face is almost entirely turned away, he does not answer. His breath comes in short pants. Valjean wonders if he had even spoken at all. The air is thick and saturated, and there is a buzzing in his ears.

Valjean resumes his work but now Javert’s noises are louder. Or perhaps he pays more attention. Or perhaps it is both. A moan, a sigh, a shifting susurrus of cloth as Javert’s legs move a little, tensing and flexing against the covers; his fingers tremble imperceptibly. Valjean balls his hands into loose fists, sinks his knuckles into the space between Javert’s shoulderblades and spine, and pushes his weight down, harder than he has dared before – and it is shameful, but he does it for no other reason than to discover what new sound Javert might make.

It is a high, keening noise at first, a hiss squeezing out from behind clenched teeth; the exhale tears itself free, explosive, then the last bits of breath ooze out in a slow, heartfelt groan. Valjean feels it in the hairs on the back of his neck. Javert is loose and emptied beneath his hands, limp and pliant. He lifts his hands away and the inhale Javert takes is ragged and ends in a sob, the pillow is wet –

“Javert,” he says, stunned, and now Javert responds, snarls aggrievedly, “See what you have done?”

Abruptly, Javert turns over, grabbing the covers to himself, and though he drags them quickly, keeping his face turned away, he is not fast enough to hide the incriminating bulge pushing at his trousers before the blankets shroud it. He passes a brisk hand over his face, and the tears are gone; it is an abrupt transformation, from ragdoll to sharp prickly Inspector again.

“Out,” he barks. Valjean is frozen, half-risen from the bed; Javert stabs his hand at the door. “Out!”

And Valjean leaves, stunned, his hands still shaking. Outside, he gives in, buries his face in his palms, inhales the sweat and salt of Javert’s back, darts out his tongue for a fraction of a second – then struck with shame, he flings down his hands, fists them in his trousers.

His hands ache all that night, hearing a dark and brooding silence from the room down the hall; his dreams are filled with the rush of blood under Javert’s skin, and the sounds the man had made, coming apart, uncoiling and unfurling like ink in water, smoke in air.


	5. Chapter 5

The summer day is hot, the air like a solid punch of sweltering heat to the face, the sunlight a glaring white agony; the dirt crumbles dry beneath Valjean’s knees as he tears up another weed, making sure that none of the long taproot remains beneath the soil.

“You are insane,” a voice drawls, made lazy with the heat, “absolutely mad.”

Valjean straightens up and twists around, squinting at the figure visible only as a silhouette in the cool shadow of the doorway. “The plants do not care whether a madman weeds them,” he answers, wiping sweat from where it trickles before his ear, “only that they are weeded. I do not suppose you would care to join me?”

Javert’s snort tells Valjean exactly what the other man thinks of that suggestion.

“Hardly,” he calls, “I will stay inside. In the nice, cool shade,” he adds pointedly. “If you dare to take heatstroke and die, I will not be the one to drag you inside, Valjean.”

Valjean only laughs in return, and hauls another weed from the earth, flinging it to the slowly growing pile at his side.

Javert’s convalescence is long since over, he has moved back to his own lodgings and returned to work; it has been more than a year since the night of the barricades, since spitting tempers and faltering explanations and, eventually, a tenuous, mutual understanding…and yet. And yet.

Still he visits, still he is here. He has become a strange fixture in Valjean’s life, these days. Cosette is wedded; Valjean sees her on occasion, but it is still not the same, and he has few acquaintances to even call his own, never mind to call his friend – and that is the thing he is beginning to suspect. Javert has become his friend, somehow, almost without his noticing.

Javert had arrived earlier this morning, when the weather was still relatively tolerable, giving no prior notification, as was his wont. “Valjean,” he had announced, that familiar irritated scowl on his face, pulling a newspaper from the depths of his coat, “have you seen this? Utter idiocy – it is a wonder they let these men outside without a keeper and a leash –” Their conversation had lasted over an hour, through Valjean’s hastily cobbled-together breakfast and between cups of coffee, as the sun marched across the sky and the air slowly grew bakingly hot.

Valjean had excused himself, then, noting how the plants drooped in the garden, parched and wilted. Had changed quickly into patched trousers, a loose and stained shirt, then hauled a watering-can outside, quenched the plants’ thirst, the desiccated soil drying almost as quickly as he poured. Had noted that the flowers near the gate looked particularly bad, and, sweating, dumped another bucketful on the shriveling vines. And all the while, Javert watched him from the doorway, expression half-amused, almost fond.

He had noticed the weeds springing up in patches around the roses and set to tugging them out only a few moments before Javert had spoken; now, he realizes, he has been neglecting his friend for nearly an hour, lost in thought and labor. With a last grunt, he rips a few weeds loose at once, dirt showering as they tear free, and gets to his feet, gathering the pile in his arms.

His lower back protests a little as he rises, cramped as it is from its locked position these past minutes, and as he straightens up fully the soreness begins to spread, making itself known in his neck and the hump of his shoulders. Valjean winces, rolls his shoulders a little, tilts his head from side to side. Simple tasks are getting harder now, his body creakier, flagging with age – though, by the grace of God, still strong enough, still alive.

Dirt caught in the hairs on his arms, sweat making his shirt cling unpleasantly to his chest, he deposits the weeds in a heap by the shed, then makes his way to the door and goes inside. Just past the threshold he stops, blinking his eyes in the sudden darkness, his sweat beginning to cool immediately in the shade.

When his eyes adjust, Javert is standing there, closer than he had expected.

“Are you done?”

Valjean nods. It is still too dark to properly read Javert’s expression.

“Well, then, you ought to change,” and his voice is wry, and Valjean is suddenly aware of how his hair sticks to his forehead. He wipes an arm across his brow.

“Oh, don’t do that, Valjean,” Javert’s voice is exasperated, his hand is on his face, thumb cool and rough, rubbing away the smear of soil, “you’ve dirt on your face,” he mutters, unnecessarily.

“Ah.” The sound is meant as an acknowledgment. It comes out colored by the stroke of Javert’s thumb, the palm against his cheekbone, more of his hand flush against Valjean’s face than, perhaps, entirely warranted – surely he is not pleasant to the touch, damp with sweat and – “Yes, I – I should wash.”

He pulls away from Javert’s unresisting hand, and paces down the hall towards his bedroom, his steps unnecessarily fast, like the hammer of his heart. The water in the washbasin in his room is tepid and does nothing to cool him down, but at least it sluices away the sweat and dirt. It does not clear away the echo of Javert’s fingertips.

Javert’s reaction to his touch, that night months past, had gone – unaddressed. Or it had been discussed in the midst of other passionate words, angry ones, and thus gone buried. His assumption had been that it was only a response to physical contact, during a moment when Javert’s self-control was not at its highest. Nothing, therefore, to do with Valjean at all.

He thinks on a younger Inspector, then, a man flinching away from a hand on the back of his neck in Montreuil-sur-Mer, eyes narrow with suspicion; he thinks on the same man’s large hands at his back, feeling for the truth under the guise of clumsy seduction. He ponders, not for the first time, whether his presumption had been wrong. He thinks of hot skin under his hands, thinks of long fingers splaying out over his scalp, a thumb brushing his cheek –

Not wanting to think any more, he tugs off his shirt, wipes sweat away and splashes more water on his face and neck. When he shrugs on a new shirt there is a sensual pleasure to the dry fabric that makes him shiver; it is not a sensation he wants to feel, not now, and he buttons the sleeves with an unaccustomed ferocity.

Footsteps behind him, and the pressure of a hand on his back – he freezes.

“You’ve been working all morning.” There is nothing but a faint and incongruous concern in Javert’s voice. His words are almost too breezy, too casual. A short, assessing rub of Javert’s hand, and Valjean sucks in a sharp breath – “I thought so,” Javert continues, “your back is sore, you were hunched over like some old grandmother.”

He speaks like he has rehearsed these lines, an odd resolution in his voice, behaving as though this is a regular occurrence, as though they are not passing now through propriety into more dangerous realms. Valjean feels Javert's hands brush his shoulders. “Come now, sit,” he hears, and he lets Javert guide him down to a stool that stands beside them. He settles carefully, bent slightly, hands on his knees. He does not turn to look at Javert’s face.

Javert’s hands are on him, then, his grasp quick and nervous, gripping almost too tightly at the slope of Valjean’s shoulders. Valjean stays still as he begins to rub, pushing in the heels of his palms, moving from his shoulders down to the center of his back. Javert’s inexperience is obvious, the force behind his hands oddly reminiscent of the way one might shove a man off-balance during an arrest, but Valjean still feels his back begin to ease, and when Javert begins to press using the tips of his long fingers, the concentrated pressure teasing apart some of the worse knots, Valjean sighs and lets his head drop between his shoulders. “God in heaven,” he mumbles, unthinkingly.

Javert lets out a strange noise, a sort of shaky, cut-off laugh. “Good, then?”

Valjean makes a sound he hopes comes across as approval – then Javert draws in a tight, determined breath behind him, sinks to his knees, and buries his face in the hollow at the back of Valjean’s shoulder; Valjean can feel the shaky exhale, warm through his shirt. He freezes.

“Javert,” he begins, not knowing what he intends to say, but does not get a chance to think of anything, as Javert turns his head a little, and his parted lips drag against Valjean’s shirt and the skin beneath – Valjean’s mind goes utterly blank – Javert is taking long, steady breaths, too measured to be natural, like a man easing off a bandage, like a man setting down a heavy load. He sighs, and it is the sound of a pretense crumbling. Then he turns his head again, his nose prodding the corner of Valjean’s shoulderblade, and presses an open-mouthed kiss near the center of Valjean’s back.

Valjean cannot think, some sort of sun has risen in the cavity of his chest, and the rays are warming his entire body with a shocking suddenness. “Javert,” he says again, feeling utterly lost.

Javert peels away from him a little bit, though his hands remain high on Valjean’s ribs, the fingers still pressed into the soreness there. “Please tell me,” he says, sounding apprehensive, “that you – understand what I am trying to say.”

“You have not said anything,” Valjean points out, though Javert’s breath on the back of his neck is highly distracting. He wants to turn – but does not know what he will see. It is all something unforeseen, unanticipated. “But I…I do believe I understand,” he says.

Javert exhales slowly. His hands squeeze, and Valjean closes his eyes, sensation mounting too high in his chest to contemplate – “And have you any sort of – response?”

Valjean turns, then, catches hold of Javert’s hand, and pulls him down; the kiss teases apart the last knot of tension in his heart, and his burdens are ash on the wind.

**Author's Note:**

> Please note I know nothing about gardening or the muscles of the back. I attempted to contort myself into uncomfortable positions to find out what muscles would hurt in what circumstances and hopefully that helped???
> 
> Also if the boner is a bit too much for the Teen rating I am happy to shift it but seriously I just want to make sure I have a work that isn't really obviously porn.
> 
> Also did I just accidentally do a five things fic? I think I did. Does this count as a thing??
> 
> Also, [here is a gifset](http://some-disgraced-cosmonaut.tumblr.com/post/18112288879) of cats giving dogs massages, because I can (the blog is not mine.)


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